Real Estate Briefs August 9, 2002

No flowery prose today – there’s too much real estate news to pass on. From the opening of the 2002 Parade of Homes to the Urban Land Institute’s mid-year projections and a plethora of new transactions to report, the dog days of August will be anything but dull.

HBA’s Parade of Homes Runs August 9-25

With Colorado Springs growing in all directions, it has become almost impossible to isolate one or two sites for the Parade of Homes. According to Janet Rummel, HBA marketing director and coordinator of the event, the 2002 Parade of Homes will include scattered locations from High Forest Ranch to the north to The Ridge at Wagon Trails to the southeast and much more. Prices will range from $1.6 million for the ultimate residence to homes priced as moderately as $126,900. As in the past, a portion of the $6 adult ticket charge will benefit Silver Key. Visitors to the Parade of Homes will also be eligible for a drawing for a $2,000 shopping spree at American Furniture Warehouse.

Maps showing the location of all nineteen homes, and tickets may be picked up at Safeway stores in Monument, Colorado Springs and Woodland Park – or Rummel recommends pulling up the HBA website at www.cshba.com.

Memorial Hospital August 1 Groundbreaking

The new Memorial Hospital Briargate Campus is underway at Union Boulevard, just north of Research Parkway. According to a spokesman for the hospital, the first office building on the drawing board will include a 63,000-square-foot, two story medical building– with additional facilities planned. Mountain View Medical Group will move fifteen to 20 physicians to the complex, taking advantage of a laboratory, occupational health, radiology, rehabilitation and after-hours clinic services offered by Memorial Hospital at Briargate. In addition to its headquarters at 1400 East Boulder, Memorial operates twelve other service centers throughout the Colorado Springs-Woodland Park area.

Transaction Report

Ted Link Guides

Carnival Expansion

Fidelity Real Estate office specialist, Ted Link, has turned in a number of transactions worth noting in the past few weeks. He represented Carnival Cruise Lines in the renewal of their current 27,000-square-foot space at 557 East Pikes Peak Ave.– and will work on the company’s expansion at the downtown Railroad Station office complex. Expansion plans are expected to be finalized by year-end. Link worked with Carnival to explore a number of properties located north of their present facility, but found the market still too high to justify the move. Ultimately, says Link, “the deal structured at the Homburg Building…will give Carnival Cruise Lines ample expansion room and a very competitive rental rate.” Sounds like some local landlords are still getting used to the realities of a softening office market.

Another lease completed by Link was a 4,882-square-foot expansion lease for the Skin Cancer and Dermatology Center of Colorado Springs, PC at 595 Chapel Hills Drive (which is now 100 percent leased). Kim Murphy of The Olive Real Estate Group represented the landlord.

Both the landlord and the tenant were represented by Ted Link on a 2,201-square-foot lease at 559 East Pikes Peak Ave. Tenant, Jane Freeman, Attorney-at-Law, is expanding her law practice and expects to move in on October 1, 2002. Link says that Freeman selected the space, in part, because of its central location.

Finally, Link reports that he represented the landlord, Bethesda Management Company, in a lease for Homes and Land of Colorado Springs at 1465 Kelly Johnson Boulevard. Tenant, Jeff Shada leased 1,725 square feet and took occupancy in July.

Palmer-McAllister Office Teams Report Deals

Mark Useman and Greg Kaufman handled both sides of the transaction on two retail leases reported in July. The first was a 1,400-square-foot lease to Mardano’s Take N Bake Italian Kitchen, a new pizza company. The second tenant, Southern Colorado Communications, Inc., also expanded into1,400 square feet in the same center, located at 3574 Hartsel Ave. Landlord, Delores Jones, owner of Woodmen Wine and Liquor, Inc. and the tenants signed the new agreements on June 28, 2002.

In the office/commercial sector, Kent Mau and Greg Phaneuf are responsible for handling both sides of the transaction on a lease for 2,520 square feet in the Alamo Corporate Center at 102 S. Tejon. The tenant, Samuelson Management, leased its new location from the landlord, Utah State Retirement Fund.

In addition, Mau and Phaneuf represented the landlord, Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, on the lease of 2,871 square feet to new Colorado Springs mortgage company, American Equity Centers in Tech Center VI at 5575 Tech Center Drive. NAI Highland Commercial represented the tenant. The Palmer-McAllister office duo also represented the tenant, M&A Administration Services, an accounting firm, on the lease of 1,377 square feet in the Palmer Center at 2 North Cascade Ave. The landlord was represented by Cushman & Wakefield and by Fountain Colony.

Finally, Greg Phaneuf worked solo, representing the landlord, H² Properties, on the lease of 5,285 square feet to UMB Bank. Palmer-McAllister broker, David Schlagel, represented the tenant in the transaction, completed on July 18, 2002. The lease brings occupancy in the Sun Plaza Building at 104 South Cascade Avenue to near capacity. Palmer-McAllister president, Gary Hollenbeck is responsible for the vision and creativity to adapt former IMS studio space into a spectacular windowed UMB downtown headquarters office with a terrific panorama of Pikes Peak and the Front Range.

Andy Lindquist of Palmer-McAllister reports the lease of 1,540 square feet to the Harris Corporation. Lindquist, who represented the landlord, Peridot Properties at 1150 Academy Park Loop, says that the tenant was represented by the Equis Corporation on the lease renewal.

Two Sales Reported by Olive Real Estate

Scott Gray of the Retail Group at Olive put his time and talents into finding just the right location for Mike Poershke and Bob Weikel, president and vice president of the former Mattress Company. The firm’s 3,400-square-foot, free-standing building at 1508 North Academy was previously occupied by Carl’s Jr. The result, says Gray, has been dramatic sales increases and foot traffic. The two owners are now looking for two additional locations.

Charley Conrad at the Olive Real Estate Group is bucking the downturn in industrial leasing trend with his sale of a 13,300-square-foot building at 3330 S. Drennan Industrial Loop. Conrad represented both the buyer, Michael Underwood, and the seller, Frank Sullo, on the transaction. Selling price was $732,500. No word yet on how the facility will be used.

NAI Highland Commercial Group Brokers Post Office Sale, Lease

Peter Scoville and Jim Spittler represented the seller on the sale of a 2,641-square-foot office building at 3545 American Drive. The buyer, Helping Stone Properties, LLC, was represented by David Ankeney, and purchase price was $303,740.

Additionally, John Onstott and Gary Bradley, both with NAI Highland, represented the landlord on the lease of 1,875 square feet at 321 South Nevada Ave. The new tenant, Staffing Group West NVOP, Inc. relocated from another downtown location.

Grubb & Ellis/Quantum Commercial Group

Andy Oyler notified the CSBJ that he’s got 2,242 square feet of Class A office space in Kissing Camels Office Park at 2950 Professional Place available for a highly desirable $10 per square foot with $5.30 triple net. Dale Stamp, managing broker for Grubb & Ellis also sent out a “wants and needs” request for a 3000- to 4000-square-foot downtown office prospect (emphasizing an October 1, 2002 occupancy). These two really utilize the RCIS e-mail pipeline. Would be interesting to know if good leads are actually generated through these efforts…

Retail specialist, Cameron Mogadam of Grubb & Ellis, represented the landlord and/or tenant on five transactions reported in July. These include two leases in the new Markets at Mesa Rid
ge Shopping Center in Fountain. The first is a lease of 1,780 square feet to Ent Federal Credit Union and the second was a 1,300-square-foot lease to Pizza Hut for a new restaurant. Mogadam represented the owner on both leases.

In other news, Mogadam also represented the tenant, $1.89 Super Quality Cleaners, on the lease of 1,400 square feet in the Pueblo West Market Place Shopping Center on Highway 50. Scott Gray of Olive Real Estate Group represented owner, The Barclay Group. He also found an 1,100-square-foot second location for the new dry cleaners at 3560 E. Woodmen Road Shopping Center, Suite 110, in Colorado Springs. Finally, Mogadam represented the owner, T-Bone Construction, on the lease of 3,000 square feet in The Palmer Plaza at 5750 Palmer Park Blvd. to Palmer Park Liquor.

The Grubb & Ellis team of George Swintz, CCIM and Mary Frances Cowan, CCIM sealed the deal on a 20,468-square-foot lease for owners, Paul and Lola Nafziger, at 4255 Sinton Road. New tenant is the State of Colorado Division of Wildlife and The Wildlife Commission, represented by Bob Hoff and Jim Schwerin of Hoff & Leigh. It’s always nice to welcome the government as a tenant– sometimes it’s a pain to go through the RFP processes, but the leases are typically secure and long-term, n’est-ce pas?

Look for another ULI update plus more real estate news in the August 16 issue.

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